Salve for Cuts and Burns

Take three carrots, grate them, place in a vessel and cover with fresh lard, simmer half an hour, strain and add sufficient beeswax to make a paste. This is a valuable ointment for cuts, burns or wounds of any kind.

Source: Fray’s Golden Recipes for the use of all ages, E. Fray

Remedy for the Ear-ache

Mix a few drops of French brandy with sweet oil and a drop of laudanum, and pour it in the ear a little warm.

Another valuable remedy is to take a few wood lice, and stew them in a little lard, (which should be very pure,) for three or four minutes; then strain it and pour some in the ear before it gets cool.

This gives almost immediate relief. The heart of a roasted onion put warm in the ear, and tie around the head a silk handkerchief, has given relief.

Source: Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, Elizabeth E. Lea

Dock Ointment

A favourite country remedy of great value in the treatment of skin diseases. Clean and bruise half-a-pound of common yellow dock root, simmer for two hours in three gills of water, strain and evaporate to half a tea-cupful. Add gradually six ounces of prepared lard and an ounce of yellow wax, which have been previously melted together. Stir the whole till cold, and apply freely.

Source: Fray’s Golden Recipes for the use of all ages, E. Fray

For Sore Throat

Make a gargle of cayenne pepper, honey and spirits, or sage tea, with alum and honey, or figs boiled, mashed and strained, and use it once in two hours. If it is very bad, steam the mouth with a funnel held over hot vinegar, and put on a hot poultice of hops, boiled in weak ley and thickened with corn-meal; there should be a little lard spread over; renew it every time it gets cold. Another very good poultice, is hot mush strewed with powdered camphor; put it on as hot as can be borne, and change it when cold. A purgative should be given, either of senna and salts, castor oil; or rhubarb and soap pills. An emetic is of great importance, and has caused the throat to break when persons have been very ill.

Sore throats have been cured when quinsy was apprehended, by using powdered camphor and lard on flannel. It is a good way, when persons are subject to it, to keep an ounce of camphor mixed with lard, in a wide-mouthed bottle, or jar; and corked tight. The cayenne pepper and honey gargle should also be kept ready mixed, and used when the first symptoms appear; or in a violent attack, a plaster of snuff and lard may be applied with benefit, keeping it on only a few minutes at a time. Sometimes a bag of hot ashes sprinkled with vinegar, and applied hot as can be borne, has cured a sore throat in one night. Persons that have been afflicted for years with repeated attacks of sore throat and quinsy, have been cured by bathing the throat, neck and ears with cold water every morning. The constant use of the shower bath is very important. Keep the feet warm.

Source: Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, Elizabeth E. Lea

Ammoniacal Pomatum for Promoting the Growth of Hair

Take almond oil, quarter of a pound; white wax, half an ounce; clarified lard, three ounces; liquid ammonia, a quarter fluid ounce; otto of lavender, and cloves, of each one drachm. Place the oil, wax and lard in a jar, which set in boiling water; when the wax is melted, allow the grease to cool till nearly ready to set, then stir in the ammonia and the perfume, and put into small jars for use. Never use a hard brush, nor comb the hair too much. Apply the pomade at night only.

Source: Our Knowledge Box, ed. G. Blackie

White Camphorated Ointment

1. Take 3 ounces 2 drachms of powdered carbonate of lead (cerussa), 45 grains of powdered camphor. Mix, and then stir into 5 ounces of melted lard.

This is applied to burns and contusions with very good effect, and is much used in Austria. The surface must not be abraded when it is applied.

2. Take 4 ounces of olive oil, 1 ounce of white wax, 22 grains of camphor, and 6 drachms of spermaceti. Melt the wax and spermaceti with the oil, and when they have cooled rub the ointment with the camphor, dissolved in a little oil. Sometimes the white wax is omitted, and lard substituted for it.

It is useful in chaps, fissures, abrasions, and roughness of the skin.

Source: The Ladies’ Book of Etiquette, and Manual of Politeness, Florence Hartley

Precipitate Ointment

Take one ounce of Venice turpentine, half an ounce of powdered precipitate, half a pound of lard, and two table-spoonsful of cold water; mix the turpentine and precipitate together with a knife; then add the lard and water, a little at a time, till it is well mixed; then put it in little boxes. This is useful to dry up a breaking out on the face or hands; care should be taken while using it, not to take cold.

Camphor dissolved in alcohol, or any white spirits, is very good to use on pimples on the face.

Source: Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, Elizabeth E. Lea

St Johnswort Ointment, and its Uses

Gather the yellow flowers of St. Johnswort while in full bloom; put them in a wide-mouthed bottle, and fill it with equal quantities of lard and sweet oil; tie a skin over it, and hang it in the sun for a month; then strain it, put it back in the bottle, and cork it up. This is one of the most effectual remedies for bruises, or for a mashed foot or hand. It should always be kept where there is a family of children.

Source: Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers, Elizabeth E. Lea

Colds on the Chest

In the treatment of ordinary colds few remedies are more efficacious than turpentine. It should be mixed with lard and sweet oil in equal proportions and spread upon flannel that has been dipped in very hot water; it should then be placed on the patient’s chest in the form of a plaster.

Source: Fray’s Golden Recipes for the use of all ages, E. Fray

To Thicken The Hair

Simmer 1/2 lb. of the best lard in a tea-cupful of olive oil half an hour, scumming all the time: add 9 drops of any scent. Rub it in three times a week.

Source: The English Housekeeper, Anne Cobbett